


shut your eyes, there are no lies

by reinacadeea



Series: Football AU [2]
Category: One Direction (Band), Radio 1 RPF
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-15
Updated: 2014-10-15
Packaged: 2018-02-21 06:57:50
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 719
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2459012
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/reinacadeea/pseuds/reinacadeea
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Harry Styles wants to come home and who is Paul to deny him.</p>
<p>or, the paul higgins ficlet set in the 'a prisoner of history' 'verse</p>
            </blockquote>





	shut your eyes, there are no lies

**Author's Note:**

> the obligatory Paul watching his boys grow up story

Paul enjoys pubs with the lads. He enjoys lager, a particularly well-served pint, dark of course, and the footy on the telly. He enjoys the rush of adrenaline and that particular feeling he gets when Arsenal scores.

He doesn't enjoy boys skulking around after nightfall.

"Tomlinson, you little bastard! Show your face," he mutters to himself after fruitlessly having searched another floor.

He's gathering up a storm when little Tommo with his cocky grin, all gone now, opens a door to his left and beckons him inside.

"I don't think he's well," Tommo says and nods towards the Academy's newest arrival.

The boy is pale and lies still in the lowest bunk bed and seems small beneath a small pile of Gunnersauruses that the other boys in the dormitory seems to have given him in comfort.

They are a new batch of players, ranging from nine to eleven, and the pale boy is one of the younger ones.

Paul sits down on the bunk bed and reaches out to touch the boy's hair. "Are you all right?" He asks softly, but doesn't get an answer, as he predicted. "What's your name?"

"Harry," Tommo helpfully supplies.

It takes Paul ten minutes to coax Harry to say something and by then he's already making plans to see a doctor. Harry is feverish and clammy and should be with his mum, not in a dormitory full of unknown boys.

Tommo frets nervously and Paul finally asks him if he wants to come with Harry to hospital. Harry needs every friend he can get.

-

Harry's sexual awakening arrives at the same time Louis is pulled from the Academy and driven to Doncaster in his mother's rusty car.

Paul sits front and centre while Harry, in his fourteen year-old awkward glory, pines. It's quite an eye-opening experience seeing a boy, a boy he might as well call his own, becoming aware of the one thing that football has no place for. He hurts for the boy, knows it will challenge his career and his personal life the day he finally puts a name on his feelings.

Maybe he should have done more, but he struggles with it too and tries to create an atmosphere that allows for little mean-spirited teasing and foul words.

And as he sees Zain Malik sock Tom Baker, he thinks Harry might not be as alone as he thought.

-

With Malik, Tommo and Haz moving to the pro team, Paul gets a substantial pay-raise and a fancy new title. He enjoys the work, the extra pressure and knowing exactly how far he can push the lads. He enjoys seeing Harry come alive when Tommo returns to AFC and re-cementing their friendship like it has only been a couple of weeks.

He has of course heard from Decky on the Under-17 team that they used to create quite the ruckus - just like they had at the Academy - and he knows deep down that their partnership will be a formidable one.

Harry is sometimes too flighty and too easy to distract, but Tommo has since his discovery of The Ruptured Appendix Scare of Oh-Nine been one of the touchstones of Harry's otherwise mental life.

-

Paul remembers Harry running smack into a pillar when he was fourteen, staring after a boy without a shirt on.

Grimshaw is one of those boys.

He's a wildcard at first - too camp and too obvious, but the wives adore him and listens rapidly as he recounts tales of his fashionable life as a Shoreditch hipster. He's loud-mouthed and opinionated and writes an article for GQ detailing jersey dos and don'ts that has most of Britain in stitches.

He's a party boy and all-around bad influence ... Except when he's not.

Harry is happy and that's the only thing he's ever wanted.

\--

 

\--

Many years later, Paul sets up a meeting with the right people. He opens the possibility for a gay player and sticks by his convictions. He puts up arguments and counterarguments and tries to measure the tolerance seen on the Board's faces.

He has set up funds, kick-started tolerance projects and fired the appropriate amount of people. He's a man of Arsenal and always has been and his projects are widely recognised and accepted.

Harry Styles wants to come home and who is Paul to deny him.

**Author's Note:**

> since Arsenal has one of the longest-serving managers in the premier league, it seems unlikely that they would change him anytime soon unless he retired. however, what is RPF fiction without a little alteration. british football academies do have boys starting at nine years old. Lional Messi is a perfect example of an academy-grown footballer, meaning they often stay at the same club their entire life or inevitably returns later on.


End file.
